There be gold and silver in thems fake teeth
Submitted by wendy on August 22, 2008 - 1:16pm.
An article on TreeHugger titled "Saving Kids and Precious Resources, One Set of Dentures At A Time" explains how Japan is taking preservation and charity to all new levels proving just how resourceful and kind of gross they are willing to be.
According to the article "Did you know that there are over 3,600,000 sets of dentures produced around the world every year? And did you know that each set contains around roughly US$25 of precious metals? But, around half of all the dentures produced simply end up being thrown onto the trash heap. That’s more than a mouthful of wasted money and precious resources. Well, now the Japan Denture Recycling Association (JDRA) has decided to sink its teeth into this problem and take a bite out of the massive waste occurring, while at the same time helping kids in
developing countries around the world.
The JDRA has established a denture recycling network of over 200 locations throughout Japan, including dental offices, where people can drop off their unwanted dentures. The dentures are recycled and proceeds from the recovered precious metals are then donated to UNICEF and other organizations. To date, some 9 kg of gold and 6 kg of silver have been recovered, with resulting donations of around $140K to UNICEF and other organizations"
So, get out there kids and start hitting up your grandparents for some of them unwanted fake teeth because at $25 a denture it's just a matter of time before we'll be seeing UNICEF collection boxes at our next dental appointment.
Link: http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/08/save-kids-resources-...
